1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technical field of an information recording medium, an information recording apparatus and method, an information reproducing apparatus and method, and a computer data signal embodied in a carrier wave. More particularly, the present invention relates to a technical field of an information recording medium in which different kinds of plural items of recording information such as audio information and video information are recorded; an information recording apparatus and method for recording information in the information recording medium; an information reproducing apparatus and method for reproducing the recorded information from the information recording medium; and a computer data signal embodied in a carrier wave, which enables a computer to perform such a recording process or reproducing process.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, there is generally known a reproduction-only video DVD that is an information recording medium in which video information such as movie including image information and music information associated with the image information is recorded. More specifically, the reproduction-only DVD is a DVD whose format is in conformity with a DVD video standard.
The video DVD is widely used as an information recording medium in which image information such as movie is recorded due to its large capacity.
On one hand, with respect to audio information such as music information, which includes sound information such as music information and voice information and also includes still image information associated with the sound information, there has been developed and commercially available an audio DVD in consideration of recording of only the audio information. More specifically, the audio DVD is a reproduction-only DVD whose recording format is in conformity with a DVD audio standard.
With respect to a case in which the video information or audio information is recorded in a DVD, a household recordable DVD and a recording format for recording video information in the household recordable DVD (hereinafter, referred to as a video recording standard) are under development. Recently, a household information recording apparatus (recorder) for recording the above video information or the like in a re-recordable DVD-RW (DVD-Re-recordable) has been further developed and commercially available.
At present, the development of a recording format for recording audio information in a DVD (hereinafter, referred to as an audio recording standard) or computer data information, for example, other than the above video information or audio information is underway.
At this time, under the above described circumference, in the near future, it is expected that there will be introduced a DVD information recording apparatus comprising two or more kinds of various functions, i.e., a video information recording function for recording video information in a DVD; an audio information recording function for recording audio information in a DVD; or data information recording function for recording the above data information in a DVD.
In this case, DVDs currently used for recording includes the above re-recordable DVD-RW or a DVD-R (DVD-Recordable) capable of only one recording and incapable of deletion. In any case, it is expected that there will be a glowing demand for a function for recording information irrespective of video information or audio information in one DVD indiscriminately, or for a function capable of recording data information acquired by electronic distribution or the like in the same DVD.
Further, in this case, it would be very effective to provide a function for freely extracting the user's desired scene, music or data information or the like from a plurality of recording information such as video information recorded in advance in a plurality of DVDs during reproduction, and freely setting even the order of reproduction such as the extracted scene or the like irrespective of various kinds of recording information.